Monday, 21 January 2013

The.worst.iced.coffee.ever

I don't see the point of drinking hot coffee in the middle of or after a ride. You're already bloody hot - why make yourself any hotter? So for me, iced coffee is the drink of choice. But it must have the following properties:

1. Iced
2. Coffee

The third ingredient of course is milk - otherwise it would just be cold straight coffee, which would be awful. Some people like to fill them with sugar - I detest that. I just want:

ice
coffee
milk

You'd think that would be nigh well impossible to fuck up. Well, you'd be wrong, as cafes manage to balls it up no end on a regular basis.

For starters - ice. In order to be icy, you need a requisite amount of ice. Not too much ice - otherwise there's no room for the milk and coffee. But there still needs to be plenty of ice - otherwise it just won't get cold enough.

Second - coffee. Coffee means coffee. As freshly made shot of coffee from a coffee machine. Coffee syrup, or a shot of coffee that was "freshly made" 4 hours ago and tipped into a jug is not fresh. Syrup is not coffee.

Third - milk. Use full cream milk. Not soy. Not low fat. I want milk. Proper milk. You think I give a shit about a few grams of fat after riding 50 kilometres? No. Bring it on, baby.

So let me explain how to make the worst iced coffee ever.

First, pour a small dash of syrup into a tall glass. Use just enough for the milk to discolour slightly, but not enough to impart even the smallest hint of coffee flavour.

Next, fill it almost to the brim with milk.

Lastly, add two ice cubes - small ones at that - because there is now no room to pour a good sized handful of ice into the glass.

Then serve.

I was at a work function when this was dished up to me, so I didn't want to make a fuss. I walked around for 10 minutes with this abomination in my hand, anxiously looking for a pot plant to pour the contents into and a table to dump the glass on. In the end, I found a drain and got rid of it that way - I wasn't in the mood for killing an innocent plant.

But I was in the mood for killing whoever trained the person that made that coffee.

Sequence is also important - put the scoop (or two) of ice cream in your tall glass, then pour the freshly-pulled shot of coffee over the ice cream. Two things happen here: the coffee cools down, and some of the coffee freezes in the "fissures" in the ice-cream.

Then add your milk (and, if you need, the cream - but that's not essential).